Tech Founder | AI Enthusiast | DevOps Expert

First Class CS degree. 20 years in technical recruiting. 2,000+ placements.                  
                                                                                               
I've built engineering teams from seed stage through to Palantir, and served as a strategic hiring partner to Insight Partners' portfolio companies. 

Currently running TalentPipe, retained search for VC-backed startups in AI/ML, fintech, and dev tools.          

What I bring:

  → Technical fluency that engineers and CTOs respect                                          
  → Founder and CTO-level relationships across NYC and London                                  
  → A track record of placements that stick (2+ year average tenure)                           
  → 14-day average time-to-offer vs 44+ industry standard                                      
                                                                                               
"Rich served as an invaluable partner to our companies, consistently providing strategic guidance and helping teams scale."
                                 
— Kaitlyn Doig, Insight Partners

Selectively taking on retained partnerships and embedded talent engagements.

Rich Roberts

Mark Whitby

Non Executive Director

In June 2008, the recession almost killed my business. I lost 3 of my 4 biggest clients and more than 50% of my income overnight. I had a mortgage, two kids and our third on the way. I was scared out of my mind... 

I'd already invested 7 years of blood, sweat & tears to build a 6-figure sales training business for the recruitment industry. Now I was starting over again. My confidence took a huge hit.

Out of desperation, I learned everything I could about digital marketing. There's so much conflicting advice about online marketing that it's easy to get confused and overwhelmed. But my back was against the wall. I had to push through and MAKE it work. I made lots of mistakes, but I eventually figured it out.

Today, apart from referrals, I get 100% of my new business from digital marketing.  Best of all, using marketing automation the inbound leads keep flowing even when I'm busy working with clients.

Now I help recruitment business owners to escape the feast/famine roller coaster and create consistent, predictable placements. Some of my clients have doubled or even tripled their billings in 90 days. Check out my 100+ LinkedIn recommendations below.

I don't claim to have all the answers, but I'm happy to share what's worked for me and the hundreds of recruitment business owners I've coached.  

𝘚𝘩𝘰𝘰𝘵 𝘮𝘦 𝘢 𝘋𝘔 𝘪𝘧 𝘺𝘰𝘶 𝘸𝘢𝘯𝘵 𝘵𝘰 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘯 𝘮𝘰𝘳𝘦.

𝗙𝗥𝗘𝗘 𝗥𝗘𝗦𝗢𝗨𝗥𝗖𝗘𝗦

☑️ Webinar: Inbound Marketing Roadmap for Recruiters - How to Generate Warm Leads on Autopilot Without Cold Calling - Register now: http://www.recruitmentcoach.com/masterclass

☑️ Case Study: Solo Recruiter Wins His First Retainer Worth £35,000 ($56,000 USD)
http://recruitmentcoach.com/case-study-solo-recruiter-wins-his-first-retainer-worth-56k

𝗡𝗘𝗫𝗧 𝗦𝗧𝗘𝗣𝗦

Curious to learn more? Book your free strategy session here:

📆 https://recruitmentcoach.com/strategy-session/

Board Advisor, Executive Coach, Management Consultant, Recruitment Trainer

Helping recruiters & recruiting firm owners to maximize billings, increase profits and accelerate business growth.  We provide the following learning & development solutions:

* In-house recruitment training courses - all levels (rookies, seniors and managers);
* One-to-one performance coaching for recruitment consultants;
* Management development programmes for billing managers;
* Director development for recruitment business leaders;
* Executive coaching & management consulting for recruitment company owners, directors, partners, presidents and CEO's; 

Plus you can access our eLearning platform to receive recruitment training videos, DVDs, webinars, and audio CDs and MP3s. These multimedia recruitment training materials serve to support, re-enforce and enhance our in-person or telephone training and coaching, or can be used to run effective and inexpensive internal training sessions.

Recruitment training solutions include over 20 courses including:

* How to Develop New Business by Phone
* Consultative Selling for Recruitment Consultants
* How to Negotiate Better Recruitment Fees & Margins
* Mastering the Placement Process
* The Billing Manager: How to Maximize Your Personal and Team Sales Performance
* Secrets of Selling Retained Recruitment Solutions
* Head-hunting Demystified - Sourcing & Recruiting Placeable Candidates
* Senior Consultant Course - How to Double Your Billings

“The contingent, multi-listed perm market… I think that is over.”

That’s Greg Savage on episode 300 of The Resilient Recruiter Podcast our biggest milestone yet.

Greg was my very first guest in 2019. Six years and 300 episodes later, he’s back with his most definitive view yet on where recruitment is headed next.

In 2023, Greg predicted AI would make some parts of recruitment harder, not easier. 

Two years later? The situation has accelerated faster than expected.

A researcher tested three major AI screening tools with the same candidates. Only 14% overlap on the shortlists.

Resume fraud is rising.

And the models built on speed alone are under pressure.

But Greg also sees a massive opportunity for recruiters who adapt.

This milestone episode covers which business models will survive, what should never be automated, and what Greg calls the rise of the “techno-empath” recruiter.

If you lead a recruitment business, this conversation will challenge how you think about positioning and relevance over the next five years.

🎧 Listen now.

Host, The Resilient Recruiter Podcast | Creator, The 6 Pillars of a 7+ Figure Business™️| Helping recruitment agency owners increase billings by 200-400% in 6-12 months with tailored coaching, courses & community.

Behind every high-performing recruitment business is a strong operating system.

That’s why I’m pleased to share that Recruiterflow is a founding sponsor of The Resilient Recruiter Podcast Live in Edinburgh this April.

Recruiterflow is the AI-first operating system for recruitment agencies and executive search firms.

Most platforms give you either a solid ATS or flashy AI tools without real operational depth.

Recruiterflow brings both together.

A powerful ATS and CRM at the core.

AI built directly into your workflows, not bolted on as an afterthought.

So your recruiters can focus on conversations and decisions, while AI handles the heavy lifting in the background.

If you’re building a modern recruitment business, this is the kind of system you run it on.

If you’d like to see it in action, you can request a demo here:
 https://lnkd.in/eZXW8DTx

We’re proud to have Recruiterflow supporting the launch of our first live event in Edinburgh.

Tickets will be released soon.

If you’d like priority access when they go live, drop EDINBURGH in the comments and we’ll add you to the list.

“I can’t keep making $40,000.”

That’s what Larissa Gerlach told her manager in her first year in recruitment.

She was doing 200+ calls a week.

Hitting the activity metrics.

Showing up every day.

And still wondering if she was cut out for it.

Three years later, she was President’s Club.

Later, the CFO of a PE-backed firm asked her to replicate her results across 25 offices.

That became a national training programme.

Here’s what she learned:

Top billers aren’t created by activity alone.

They’re built inside environments that demand repetition, accountability, and practice.

In this episode of The Resilient Recruiter Podcast, we break down what that environment actually looks like and why most founders struggle to build it.

If you’re building a team, this conversation may change where you focus.

🎧 Episode 301 is live.

Thanks to Recruiterflow for supporting this episode.

In 2023, Greg Savage predicted AI would make recruitment harder, not easier. Two years later, the situation has accelerated faster than expected. Screening tools produce only 14% overlap. Resume fraud is rising. And speed-based models are under pressure.

But Greg also sees massive opportunity for recruiters who adapt.
This milestone conversation covers which business models will survive, what should never be automated, and what Greg calls the rise of the "techno-empath" recruiter.

If you lead a recruitment business, this episode will challenge how you think about positioning and relevance.

🎧 Listen to Episode 300

Six years ago, when I launched The Resilient Recruiter Podcast, my very first guest was Greg Savage. Since then, we’ve lived through a global pandemic

Open article: AI Predictions vs Reality: Why AI Has Made Recruitment Harder (Not Easier) by Mark Whitby • 4 min read

AI Predictions vs Reality: Why AI Has Made Recruitment Harder (Not Easier)

Want to get your new recruiters productive fast and maximize your team’s performance?

Let us transform new hires into confident, self-sufficient billers -- without you taking time away from your own desk. 

We’re running a structured, 18-week training program built specifically for recruitment agency teams. 

There are two tracks - you can enroll in either, or both:

Recruitment Sales Mastery - Starts March 17th
Turn your recruiters into business developers. They’ll learn how to generate consistent new business, including planning, lead generation, cold calling, objection handling, and more.

Recruiting Excellence  - Starts May 26th
Give your recruiters the skills to close more placements. They’ll learn how to fill more jobs, faster, including advanced sourcing strategies, candidate qualification, offer management, and more.  

Each track delivers 10 weeks of live training followed by 8 weeks of coaching and role play to ensure skills stick. Plus scripts, frameworks, weekly assignments, and manager feedback/reporting.

Led by my colleague, Larissa Gerlach. 15 years of recruitment and sales leadership. She has trained 300+ recruiters who now generated millions in placement fees. 

Full details in the comments.

Brendan Thomas started his recruiting career at 36. Got fired the day he closed a $60,000 fee. Started over six days later.

Five years on, he has generated over $5 million in billings largely by targeting the accounts most recruiters are told to avoid.

This conversation covers how he breaks into enterprise clients, navigates HR gatekeepers, and earns the kind of access that turns one placement into a long-term partnership.

If you're building towards larger accounts, this is the playbook.

🎧 Listen to Episode 302

One placement can be a transaction. Or it can be the start of a long-term enterprise relationship. Most recruiters treat it like the first. Brendan Th

Open article: How to Win Enterprise Clients and Turn One Deal Into Recurring Revenue by Mark Whitby • 4 min read

How to Win Enterprise Clients and Turn One Deal Into Recurring Revenue

You call a client six months after the placement.

"Oh… he left."

You had no idea.

Most recruiters have been there. You make the placement, celebrate, and move on. The pressure to fill the next role takes over.

Lewis Waitt and Jessica Multhauf see the placement as the starting line. 

Their firm offers a 12-month guarantee on every placement. And more than 90% of their hires are still in the role after a year.

How?

Because they stay involved long after the candidate starts. Structured check-ins at 30, 60 and 90 days, then quarterly conversations throughout the first year.

It's a simple idea, but very few recruitment firms actually do it.

We unpack their full process in this week's episode of The Resilient Recruiter Podcast.

🎧 The episode goes live this Wednesday.


Out of curiosity, how long do you stay involved after a placement?

“You are going to be told no more often than yes. And that's okay.”

Brendan Thomas said that when he joined me on The Resilient Recruiter Podcast.

He has generated over $5 million in billings across six years in the industry.

And much of that success has come from focusing on the accounts many recruiters are advised to avoid.

Enterprise clients.

The organisations with hundreds of open roles, multiple layers of HR, and vendor lists you’re not on.

Brendan goes after them anyway.

He leads with a real candidate. Reaches out to the hiring manager. And when the answer is no, he asks why.

Over time, those conversations start to open doors.

Access to hiring manager calendars. Direct relationships. Ongoing partnerships.

In this episode, Brendan explains how he breaks into enterprise accounts, earns trust with HR, and gradually turns one placement into long-term client relationships.

If you're prepared to hear more no's than yes's, this episode shows you exactly what to do with them.

🎧 Listen now to The Resilient Recruiter Podcast.

This episode is brought to you by Recruiterflow - an end-to-end, AI-first ecosystem to run and scale your recruitment business.

"We're not another yes person to our clients. They bring us in because we challenge them."


Lewis Waitt and Jessica Multhauf run ALINITI, a Cincinnati-based firm that has been working with privately held and family-owned businesses for 25 years.

They didn't start as a recruitment firm. They started as HR and organizational development consultants. Recruiting came later, after they kept seeing other agencies fall short for their clients.

That background changes everything about how they work.

Before every search, they run a 90-minute role clarity session. They challenge unrealistic briefs. They write the job description themselves.

And when the candidate starts, they don't move on to the next role.

They stay involved for 12 months.

30, 60, and 90-day check-ins. Quarterly conversations. Joint meetings with the new hire and their manager. A readiness chart tracking progress all the way to month 12.

The result?

More than 90% of their placements are still in the role after a year.

So they back every search with a 12-month guarantee.

This episode covers how they built a four-service business that weathers downturns, why the placement is just the starting line, and what most recruitment firms get wrong about client relationships.

🎧 This week's episode of The Resilient Recruiter is available now.

Out of curiosity, how long do you stay involved after a placement?

"Investing in somebody's training will immediately impact your bottom line."

That's Larissa Gerlach. She's trained recruiters who are now billing over $2 million a year.

She knows what works. And she knows what agency owners get wrong.

Most skip training because it doesn't seem to make money right now.

It does. 

It just takes longer than a quick fix.

That's why we built The Academy. 

18 weeks. 

Live sessions. 

Real skills that stick.

Business Development track starts March 17. 

Recruiting Excellence track starts May 26.

👉 https://lnkd.in/eFexNNQb

Most recruitment databases aren’t talent pools.

They’re candidate graveyards.

Greg Savage shared a stat that should make every agency owner pause.

Around 40% of candidates sourced from job boards were already sitting in the recruiter’s own database.

Think about that.

You paid to find someone you already had.

We love to say, “We’ve got 500,000 candidates on our system.”

But if you can’t surface the right people at the right moment, what does that number actually mean?

That’s not a sourcing issue.

It’s a database issue.

And the encouraging part? This is one area where AI can genuinely help right now.

Used properly, it can clean your data, resurface dormant candidates, and highlight matches you would otherwise miss.

You don’t need a bigger database.

You need a better one.

Fix that, and you create an immediate advantage over firms still posting and praying.

🎧 Greg breaks this down in episode 300 of The Resilient Recruiter Podcast.

Want to know why most recruiters are curious about AI but never fully commit to using it?

They don't trust it.

And honestly, that's fair.

Most AI matching tools hand you a ranked shortlist and expect you to accept it. No context. No reasoning. Just trust the algorithm.

That's not how good recruiters think.

Your clients pay for your judgment. A black box doesn't give you that.

I've been looking at how Recruiterflow's AIRA Matchmaker works and this stood out to me.

Unlike most matching tools, it shows you the reasoning behind every shortlist. 

Which criteria matched? 

Why is one candidate ranked above another? 

A score you can actually explain to your client.

You set the criteria in plain language. Edit it. Prioritise it. Run it again.

The tool works around your judgment, not instead of it.

Recruiters don't resist AI because they're anti-technology.

They resist it when they can't see what's happening.

When the reasoning is visible, trust follows. And that's when AI actually gets used.

Link in comments.

How long does it take new recruiters to become consistent billers?

The reason I ask is that most recruitment agencies that scale run into a speed bump.

New recruiters take too long to start producing and training pulls you away from your own desk.

Overheads increase while your own production suffers.

That's why Larissa Gerlach and I are offering a structured, 18-week recruiter training program.

It's designed to get your new hires up to speed faster so you don't have to train them yourself.

Let us develop your recruiters into self-sufficient billers.

DM me for full details.

How long does it take new recruiters to become consistent billers?

From $400K to zero.

Then nothing for six months.

Harrison Wright launched his recruitment business and billed nearly $400,000 in his first six months.

Then the market turned.

Hiring froze. Searches disappeared. He was burning $30,000 a month just to stay afloat.

Most recruiters would respond by doing more.

More calls. More CVs. More pressure.

He did exactly that.

It didn’t work.

So he rebuilt the business.

Today, he runs a retained model with an interview-to-placement ratio of 2.16 to 1 and clients worth more than $350,000 over time.

This episode looks at what actually changed.

🎧 Listen to The Resilient Recruiter Podcast link in comments.

This episode is brought to you by Recruiterflow - an end-to-end, AI-first ecosystem to run and scale your recruitment business.

taplio

The Battle

Rich Roberts

Mark Whitby

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance ScoreMark Whitby's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

taplio

The Battle

Rich Roberts

Mark Whitby

Followers

Posts

Engagements

Likes

Performance Score.css-goub6s{font-size:var(--chakra-fontSizes-md);font-weight:500;color:var(--chakra-colors-gray-600);display:block;margin-top:var(--chakra-space-1);}Mark Whitby's LinkedIn Performance

Ready to grow your LinkedIn presence?

Performance ScoreMark Whitby's LinkedIn Performance